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captioning sponsored by cbs this is the "cbs evening news." >> cordes: good evening. i'm nancy cordes. we begin tonight with the ongoing search for sush viefers, and the accounting of the dead after nearly two days of tornadoes. more than three done people in six states have been killed, and at least 90 tornadoes have been confirmed, striking at least 162 towns. among the hardest hit communities is west liberty, kentucky. and that's where anna werner begins our coverage tonight. anna, good evening. >> reporter: good evening, nancy. you know, this was a town, a picturesque town sitting in the foothills will of the appalachian mountains. now it looks like something put the town through a blender. there are bits and pieces of buildings everywhere. the tornado shredded buildings and lives. kentucky's governor said it looked like a bomb had hit downtown west liberty.

down a small town main street that had led to city hall, the police station, the courthouse, and a chinese restaurant, the tornado left a trail of rubble. 120-mile-per-hour winds took town billions, crushed cars, and sheered off trees. and the tornado claimed lives. five people died. police say what is left is a disaster scene so dangerous, they had to close off access to downtown. >> we're asking everybody to stay out. it's-- as you can see, it's a very dangerous area. a lot of building structures can fall down. we've had people that want to take a look at their own personal business and we can't take that chance on further injuries. >> reporter: the tornado struck at 6:45 friday night, and approached so quickly, some residents say they had little time to take cover. >> we headed out for town, to go to the white house. and then when we get over there, it blew the windows out, so we had to go into the back room. >> i looked out the window, and

i could see it. i said, "i can see it, i can see it." she said, "get in the back room." i went to the back and i closed the door and i started praying and i covered my head and she said, "stay on the phone." and then the phone died and the door flew open and glass and things were going everywhere. >> reporter: nancy, tonight, search-and-rescue efforts here are just about concluded, and officials say they will soon be moving into what is bound to be a very difficult cleanup. >> cordes: anna werner in west liberty, kentucky, thank you. a baby girl is reported in critical condition after being found alone in a field near her gnome in new piccan indiana. a hospital official says her entire family-- mother, father, brother, and sister-- were all killed in the storm. elsewhere in indiana, survivors are counting their blessings. elaine quijano is in the town of henryville tonight. >> reporter: wayne talbott used to have one of the best views in henryville but no

longer. perched high on a hill, he sees only destruction. >> i worked all my life to have what we have, and it's all gone in 15 seconds, and... it's almost more than you can bear. >> reporter: just before the tornado reached his house, he managed to get his quadriplegic daughter to an interior room. then he heard the roar. >> i just got back in the front door, and went to shut the door and it hit and i couldn't close the door. i had to hold on to the door. >> reporter: he remembers saying a prayer. >> "dear lord, please take care of us." and he did. >> good girl, careful, find it. >> reporter: search teams scoured henryville, a town of 1900, for survivors. paige kolok and her partner patty hanifen, and search dog evie, began combing through the

debris hours after the storm hit yesterday afternoon. >> we came at night so we searched, but you can also see as far as your flashlight can show you and we knew it was bad. >> reporter: so bad, damage scattered across the town. still, wayne talbott is grateful for what he does have left. >> there's no amount of money that means anything compared to your life. and so many other people weren't that fortunate. and i'm so sorry. >> reporter: wayne talbott doesn't think he can stand to rebuild his home. he plans to clean up his property, sell it, and move on. nancy. >> cordes: elaine quijano for us tonight in indiana. oil giant b.p. is calling it a big step towards putting the worst oil spill in u.s. history behind it. last night the company announced it had struck a military billion-dollar deal with thousands of plaintiffs in the lawsuit over the 2010 disaster in the gulf. so is it case closed? here's mark strassmann. >> reporter: almost two years

later, b.p. is still paying for the 20 ix million gallons of oil that bled into the gulf. the settlement covers claims from 120,000 gulf residents and business people in the spill zone. remember, b.p. has already paid $8 billion to settle individual claims and $14 billion more to clean up the gulf and restore its economy. environmental lawyer stuart smith calls it the largest liability case in the history of the world. >> i would imagine they're looking to try to get out of this thing for somewhere under $30 billion total. >> reporter: a $30 billion a best-case scenario? >> i think that's a pretty good number. >> reporter: and a worst-case scenario? >> 50. >> reporter: b.p.'s environmental fines could reach $17 billion. regular negligence is carelessness. gross negligence is a reckless disregard. essentially you're saying, "i don't care if you're going to get hurt."

>> reporter: the settlement excludes the federal government, gulf states suing b.p., possible criminal charges and any plaintiffs still suing on their own. >> one of the things the clients want is, besides compensation, they want the truth. >> reporter: by settling, b.p. could avoid more public scrutiny into what went wrong in the spill and why. mark strassmann, cbs news, new orleans. >> cordes: now to campaign 2012. republicans in washington state held their caucuses today. the results come out later tonight. the candidates, though, are look, ahead to super tuesday this week. that's when 10 states hold caucuses or primaries with 437 delegates up for grabs. we have two reports from the campaign trail tonight. first, jan crawford, who is with the romney campaign in cincinnati, ohio. >> my goal if i were to become president is pretty straightforward-- i want more jobs for the people of home. , for the people of america. >> reporter: in this key trying to

manage expectations. he wants to win and he's fighting hard. romney's closed the gap with rick santorum. just last week, one poll had him down by double digits. the latest polls show he's cut that to four, within the margin of error. in the campaign events he has kept his focus on president obama. >> he wants to raise taxes. it will kill jobs. i will lower taxes to create more jobs and rising incomes. >> reporter: in television ads he's hit rick santorum hard. >> just another washington insider. >> reporter: when voters in ohio and nine other states cast ballots on tuesday, romney is counting on wins in at least three-- vermont, his home state of massachusetts, and virginia. and he's expected to win the overall delegate battle. but ohio is a statement, a big midwestern state that could show romney is in command of the race. now, if he does win here, romney has an even better argument, that he is the only candidate who can take on president obama because he's got the

organization and he also appeals to a broad range of voters. now to lima, ohio, where dean reynolds is with the santorum campaign. >> reporter: ever since his defeat in michigan last tuesday, rick santorum has been explaining himself. >> i know sometimes i can get a little wound up. you see, i don't often use a teleprompter. and so the words that come out of my mouth are my own. they're not written by some poll-tested speechwriter. >> reporter: trying to keep his controversial positions on social issues from drowning out his message, the former senator today tried to steert discussion back toward the economy. >> in my budget that i propose, i will spend less money every year than the year before for four years until we get to a balanced budget in five years. ( applause ). >> reporter: he's slightly ahead in the polls here but could come out a loser even if he wins on tuesday. his campaign failed to fill out the proper paperwork, and it may cost him 18 convention

delegates. a lack of organization that, to the romney campaign, disqualifies santorum as a serious contender. >> that's okay. if that's-- if that's-- if that's the only thing that they find is a problem with my candidacy, we're in pretty good shape. >> reporter: a win here in ohio is critically important for santorum because it would underline his argument that he is more popular than romney in the states republicans will need this fall. nancy. >> cordes: dean reynolds on the campaign trail tonight. dean, thanks. conservative rush limbaugh issued an apology today to the woman who he described as a shut and a prostitute on his radio show wednesday. sandra fluke drew limbaugh's ire after she testified on capitol hill in favor of insurance coverage for contraceptives. in a statement posted to his web site, limbaugh says he's sorry for his "insulting word choices." coming up on tonight's cbs evening news, a wounded press

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mix it into skillet dishes, for an instant dose of... hell-o! [ female announcer ] new swanson flavor boost. >> cordes: china today called on syria's government and rebel fighters to put down their weapons and start talking. it was a major shift for china, which twice vetoed u.n. security council resolutions condemning the assad regime. assad's forces have launched new attacks on civilians in homs and blocked the international red cross from delivering its first truckloads of humanitarian aid. in damaskas, syria, the bodies the bodies of american journalist marie colvin and french photographer remi ochlik have been handed over to foreign diplomats. they were killed in the shelling of homes 11 days ago. colvin's photographer paul conroy was wounded in that attack and is now recovering in london where he spoke to our charlie d'agata. >> reporter: at the height of the relentless onslaught of

homs, like countless civilians, veteran photo journalist paul conroy found himself trapped. then, he says, the syrian army took aim at the building journalists were working in. do people believe this is a targeted attack? >> when i look back at it, it was an attack. it fitted none of the patterns which normally the shelling was random. this did what it was meant to do. >> reporter: an ex-british artillery man himself, conroy described how syrian forces shelled the building. the first shots hit wide. a second round narrowed their target. >> the shots hit the house, and they fired and killed two very good people, wounded a few others, and destroyed the building. >> reporter: shrapnel shattered conroy's left leg, and he was losing blood, doctors at a makeshift field hospital bandaged him up. >> and they have nothing.

they have basic bandages, sutures, and they have people come in, legs amputated, babies sliced in half-- you know, every kind of trauma that artillery shells and rockets can provide are seen in that hospital, and it is a slaughter house. >> reporter: he believes president bashar al-assad has begun a systematic assault on the civilian population. >> this is the start-- once they've crushed homs, they will seek to eliminate all resistance in syria. and by "eliminate" i mean eliminate. i don't mean silence. i mean kill, crush, maim, bury. >> reporter: now that pictures like his will no longer bear witness and journalists are among the targets, conroy fears that syrians are facing a massacre largely unseen by the world. charlie d'agata, cbs news, london. >> cordes: to iran now, where votes are still being counted from yesterday's parliamentary elections.

as elizabeth palmer reports from tehran, it was a battle between two political extremes with no place for would-be reformers. >> reporter: this election was a contest between one faction of hard-line conservatives backed by iran's supreme leader, and another backed by president mahmoud ahmadinejad. it wasn't a radical choice. but some voters were perfectly happy with it. others, disgusted that hundreds of reform candidates had been disqualified, stayed well away. the boycott worried the esteemed leaders, as they needed a strong showing to legitimize their anti-western policies, and, apparently, they got it. although there's no way to independently verify the claim, the regime says more than 60% of eligible voters in iran did cast a ballot. on the northern edge of tehran, where a cable car runs up to the local ski hill, the middle class has come to take a break.

in the past, many of these people, totally disenchanted with their leaders, would have had nothing to do with an election. but this time, with israel talking about a military strike and harsh u.s. sanctions starting to bite, some said it was different. "when there are pressures from outside" said mohammed, "we have to come together, even if we are against the government." a resolution with the west to iran's dangerous stawfd off its nuclear program looked remote for this election. now with religious hard-liners look set to dominate the parliament, it looks virtually impossible. >> cordes: elizabeth palmer tehran tonight, thank you. inkles think again. ? [ female announcer ] with olay regenerist wrinkle revolution, it's possible to reduce the look of wrinkles in just 10 minutes. now you've seen it. experience it for yourself.

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to the voters who know him best. >> we need to control spending, reform government, and balance generation. theory. it's what we did. >> cordes: what gingrich did from 1979 to 1999 was represent georgia in congress, the last four years as speaker of the house. >> i ran for five years and lost twice before i finally won. then we spent 16 years creating a majority. the folks here were very supportive for a very long time. >> cordes: he's been campaigning down memory lane this week from atlanta and savannah to carlton, the west georgia town where he taught college in the 1970s. attorney randy evans was his student and has served as an adviser ever since. >> when we became speakener 1995, there were-- there were thousands of things that he wanted to do because he knew that for over 40 years, the democrats had been in control, and he wanted to make big changes fast. >> cordes: big changes from

term limits to welfare reform, which gingrich proposed in a manifesto he called the contract with america." rick tyler, his spokesman for the last 12 years, now helps run a super pac supporting gingrich. >> the whole contract with america was a management document and basically said if you elect us we'll do these things. elected, to the shock of everybody, they did these things. >> cordes: georgia is at the heart of gingrich's southern strategy with alabama, mississippi, and louisiana all holding primaries later this month. >> in the end, republicans are going to say who can beat obama? romney is so far failed to close that sale. >> cordes: despite all the focus on ohio, georgia actually has the most delegates at stake on super tuesday, 76. polls show gingrich leading in georgia right now by double digits. coming up, rerun in russia as voters get set to return vladimir putin to the top

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the cards say the lucky man is... vladimir putin. "you'll be happy with him," the fortune teller says. but not everyone is happy with putin. protesters have been on the streets, concerned this vote may be as rigged as the suspect parliamentary elections last year. putin says he's not worried. the demonstrators may be the first harbingers of a democratic russian spring. >> no, i'm not concerned. i think about the people, the ordinary people in russia. >> reporter: the citizens, show, are wary. putin's famous strong man image no longer intimidates them as much. groups have formed to try to make sure ballot boxes aren't stuffed this time, even if andrei buzin says his team doesn't have the numbers to everything. how many stations can you cover? 2,000 polling stations. >> reporter: and there are about 100,000 being used? >> yes, yes.

>> reporter: yet, putin doesn't need to cheat. ask these workers at this bakery an hour's drive from moscow who they're going to vote for, and they'll reflect the national poll numbers. putin, they say, offers what they want most, stability. there may be a growing opposition movement to vladimir putin's methods. but there is still no widely acceptable alternative to putin the man. for all the talk of a russian spring, it's still winter. two things haven't changed since the fall of communism it's weather and stronged man politics. mark phillips cbs news, moscow. >> cordes: and that is the cbs evening news. later on cbs "48 hours mystery." i'm nancy cordes. cbs news in new york. jeff glor will be here tomorrow. good night. captioning sponsored by cbs captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

trying to operate as turbulence on the ground. a bumpy ride awaiting passengers of two airlines trying to operate as one. putting young minds to work. how one city is hoping to fight crime with paychecks. and saved from certain death. these hens are on the road to recovery. why they still need your help. cbs 5 eyewitness news is next. ,,,,